Responding to a wide variety of work can feel like comparing apples to oranges to bananas-- ultimately an arbitrary process and a nourishing one.

For me, each piece represented a window into the world of the artist. The ones that drew me in seemed to transcend the physical surface, many times through the use of layering in color and value and content. If I was able to toggle back and forth between the actual surface and beyond it to the space it described, and this journey was satisfying, I responded to the work.

I looked for pieces that were presented simply, with framing that did not distract.

I had a preference for images that appeared to emerge from personal experience and not from mass media sources.

If I could throw out a challenge to your members, it would be to continue to follow your own vision, and for those of you who draw and paint, to keep improving your drawing skills. As Ingres has said and I believe: Drawing is the probity of art.

Juror's Bio

Diane Tesler began her painting career in Hawaii. After relocating to Virginia, Diane joined the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria where she is a painting instructor at the Art League School. She now divides her year between studios in Alexandria and Kewanna, Indiana. Educated at Antioch College in Ohio, Tesler most recently had one-person exhibitions at the Midwest Museum of American Art, Vanderbilt University, and the Evansville (IN) Museum of Arts and Science. Her work is in the collection of MCI, Bristol Meyers Squibb Corporation, The National Institutes of Health, and American General Finance. Tesler has been featured in American Artist and awarded a fellowship from the Virginia Museum of Fine Art, Richmond, and merit awards from the Butler Museum of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio.